Tag Archives: #BlackLivesMatter

“Of all areas of life, sports should be the arena least touched by politics. For the glory of being a sports fan is precisely that we are engaging in fun and play, that we are permitted to be ‘irrational’; that is, to be Yankee or Mets fans, to love our team and to hate the enemy, without having to ground these passions in systematic, moral or metaphysical theory. So it is particularity obnoxious when the gaggle of left Puritans invades and takes over the field of sports. Which they have done, of course, with a vengeance.

The Hate Thought squad has run rampant in sports for years. Veteran and respected sports figures, such as Al Campaneris and Jimmy the Greek, have seen their careers destroyed because they gave one politically improper answer to an interviewer’s question. No one dares even explore whether or not the answers were correct; their very expression is a hate-thought-crime; unlike other, seemingly graver, crimes, from their punishment there is no reprieve.

I like to think that sports writers are above politics’ that sports and only sports fill their minds. But now, they too have succumbed, and are, in fact, viciously leftist whenever politics is deemed relevant to sports.”

I’m glad I genuinely don’t give a shit about the NFL situation right now. By “not giving a shit”, I mean not getting angry about the whole situation. I have my opinions about the whole situation, but I’m not as angry about it as it seems like everyone else is.

In fact, I actually find myself siding more with the players. I’m not going to preach at anyone, but raising awareness about police brutality should not be an issue. It especially shouldn’t be an issue if your problem with it comes from the fact that people aren’t obeying ridiculous customs towards a piece of cloth and a song. You had family that died. That’s tragic. But if you say that person died “protecting our freedoms”, why are you getting mad when anyone exercises those freedoms? I can understand that you want people to show respect to those that died believing they were protecting freedoms (whether or not they were is a separate issue). But what freedoms are being defended if people can’t take a knee during the national anthem? Or keeping their hat on? Once again, I get the whole “respect” thing, but you have to see the point that dying for freedoms is pointless if people can’t exercise them. And yes, I know, “You have the freedom to complain about people kneeling”. But I’m going to side with people raising awareness about police brutality more than I’m going to side with people who unquestioningly worship the American flag and support American soldiers, no matter how unjust their involvements may be. If you always believe that the soldiers from your country are always doing good things in the world, and are always commanded to do good things in the world, you have a very naive way of looking at the world. And for that, I side with the players. Their cause makes a HELLUVA lot more sense.

And, besides: Doesn’t the NFL raise awareness for causes? Don’t they wear pink for breast cancer awareness? Why can’t the players raise awareness about police brutality? Especially when your problem with it is that a piece of cloth isn’t being worshiped, and soldiers aren’t being unquestioningly worshiped, even though many of them come back full of guilt for the heinous acts they were “commanded” to commit? If soldiers keep coming back with PTSD because of the violence they either saw happen or committed themselves, maybe we should start asking why they are making the decisions to subject themselves to that in the first place? Why isn’t “protecting the freedoms of Americans” enough for them to avoid the PTSD of witnessing bloodshed? Perhaps that’s the question we should start asking instead of worshiping the stars and bars and those that fight for it.